Why are Christians so mean?

                I shared a story on Facebook about some Texas Republicans “declaring war” on “homofascists.” A friend commented: “Why is it always Christians spewing this toxic, hateful rhetoric?” Good question.

1.  Demographics. Hate and ignorance know no ideological bounds. Atheists, Muslims, Buddhists, Democrats – they’ve all got their meanies. However, the U.S. remains a majority Christian demographic (~70%). Statistically speaking, there is a high probability that some guy spouting nonsense self-identifies as a Christian. And while Christianity supposedly teaches love of neighbor, well, so does everyone’s mom, yet we still have bullies. I pray fewer people judge all Christians based on the bad behavior of some – but that means more Christians have to do better at not being buttheads.
   
2.  Exclusivity. Demographics aside, there is something else that makes religious/ideological people, in particular, susceptible to mean-speak. Adherence to creed or philosophy implies exclusivity. Some of us try to be gentler about it than others, but even the most “progressive” have “us” and “them.” It’s a philosophical axiom: “If a word can mean anything, it doesn’t mean anything at all.” If I identify as a “Christian” or “Democrat,” then these words must mean something, or they mean, literally, nothing. “Christian” means “x” – and, by definition, not “z.” Otherwise, why would I identify as such in the first place? Nice, self-aware folks try to approach this with humility, but put this basic principle in the hands of a maladjusted grown-up-adolescent, and you get the weird wing of the Texas Republican party.
   
3.  History. But there’s more. It’s the historical principle of the “dying fish”™. People who fish know that a fish is never more violent and unmanageable, noisy and silly-looking, than when it is flopping around in the boat, gasping for air. A particularly prudish and parochial form of Christianity held massive sway in North American culture until the late 19^th century. During the post-Enlightenment scientific era (epitomized by Charles Darwin), Christians began to fear losing their power, and a lot of them lost their minds, too. Thus, the dawn of Fundamentalism – a modern phenomenon of desperately clinging to a “truth” (called into question) and the power it once allowed some people to wield. Nearly 200 years later, North American Christian Fundamentalists are gasping for air. They are increasingly irrelevant. No one’s listening anymore – especially their grandchildren. So they flop and thrash and jump and look all kinds of silly and noisy, because they know they’ve lost. If they weren’t so mean, I’d feel sorry for them. But my sympathy would likely just enrage them even more. So I’ll just wait for their ideology to breathe its last and be relegated to the dustbin of history, where it belongs.

That’s what I think today. It’s not just Christians. We’re just (nominally) the biggest group of people; who believe that believing matters; and some of us have combined that with a neurotic obsession aggravated by the slow but certain death-knell of a world in which it feels like believing in anything at all doesn’t matter anymore.

I want to be clear: I believe in believing. Not just “Christian” believing. I long for a world infused with mystery and hope, faith and wonder, commitment and witness. I just also long for a world in which people who believe are able to do so without, as my friend said, spewing “toxic, hateful rhetoric.” I happen to believe that world is emerging, and I am committed to helping it emerge. And I might even go to the funeral when the noisy fish finally breathes its last.